Ingredient

Egusi

Egusi is the seed of a West African melon, ground to a coarse meal and used to thicken and enrich stews. It is oil-rich and mildly nutty, and when it cooks it sets into soft curds through the sauce — a texture that has no real equivalent in European cooking and is the whole point of the dish.

What it is

The seeds come from melons grown across West Africa for the seed rather than the flesh — the fruit itself is bitter and not eaten. The seeds are shelled, dried and either sold whole or ground.

They are high in oil and protein, and mild in flavour: nutty, faintly sweet, a little like a pumpkin seed. On their own they taste of very little, which is why egusi dishes are heavily seasoned.

What makes egusi distinctive is what happens when the ground seed meets hot liquid. The oil separates out and the solids set into soft, slightly grainy curds suspended in the sauce, giving a thick, rich, textured stew rather than a smooth one. Cooked differently, it can instead be fried into a paste first, which gives a smoother and more integrated result.

The two ways to cook it

The choice determines the texture, and both are correct.

1. The lumping method. Mix the ground egusi with a little water or stock into a thick paste.
2. Drop spoonfuls of that paste into the simmering stew base and leave them undisturbed for several minutes so they set.
3. Only then stir gently. You end up with distinct soft curds through the sauce, which is the texture most Nigerian cooks are after.
4. The frying method. Fry the dry ground egusi in hot palm or vegetable oil, stirring, until it darkens slightly and smells toasted.
5. Add the stock and the rest of the ingredients to that, and the egusi disperses into a smoother, more uniform, thicker sauce.
6. Either way, cook it long enough for the raw seed taste to go — a good twenty minutes at least — and expect oil to rise to the surface, which is normal and is part of how the dish looks when it is right.

What goes in an egusi stew

It is a family of dishes rather than one recipe, and versions differ across Nigeria, Ghana and Cameroon.

• Palm oil, which gives the characteristic deep orange-red colour and a distinct flavour. Vegetable oil works and tastes different.
• Onion, chilli and tomato or pepper, blended into a base.
• Leafy greens — bitterleaf, ugu (fluted pumpkin leaf), spinach, or kale as a substitute — added towards the end.
• Meat or fish — beef, goat, tripe, smoked or dried fish, stockfish. Often several at once, which is characteristic.
• Crayfish, ground dried shrimp, which contributes a great deal of savouriness and is close to essential.
• Locust bean (iru or dawadawa), fermented and pungent, in many versions.
• Stock cubes and salt, used generously and openly in West African home cooking.

Egusi and its relatives

Egusi

Ground melon seed. Thickens by setting into curds or dispersing into the sauce. Mild and nutty.

Ogbono

Ground wild mango seed. Thickens into something genuinely slippery and drawing — a texture prized in Nigerian cooking and startling if you are not expecting it. Not a substitute for egusi.

Groundnut / peanut

Used similarly to thicken and enrich in maafe and groundnut stew. Much more strongly flavoured than egusi.

Agushi

The Ghanaian name for essentially the same seed, used in similar dishes.

Substituting

Ground pumpkin seeds are the closest available substitute for texture and flavour, though they are more assertive and greener.

Common questions